April 18th: "Love? Do I love?"

I read this first as a chapter epigraph in Gaudy Night. It’s great, isn’t it?

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from “The Second Brother: an Unfinished Drama”
by Thomas Lovell Beddoes

…Love? Do I love? I walk
Within the brilliance of another’s thought,
As in a glory. I was dark before,
As Venus’ chapel in the black of night:
But there was something holy in the darkness,
Softer and not so thick as other where;
And, as rich moonlight may be to the blind,
Unconsciously consoling. Then love came,
Like the out-bursting of a trodden star…